Jeram Patel was born in 1930 in Sojitra, Kaira Dist., Gujarat, India.

In 2018, the artist achieved a new high in the auction market with the sale of Ascending Planes (1961), offered in the Modern Indian Art by Asta Guru, which concluded on 27 March 2018 at Mumbai, achieving a sale price of ₹48,89,508 ($75,458.51). This record marked a defining moment in the artist's market history, reflecting both the significance of the artwork and its reception within the broader art world.

When he [Jeram Patel] came to Baroda in the early sixties, Jeram’s imagery drew heavily upon the torn and tormented Picassoid figural type reminiscent of Souza. In Baroda and then Ahmedabad, he began assemblages and heavy impasto on boards, which he then scorched with a blowtorch, leaving charred hollows as well as blistered imprints of flame on the surface…The assemblage of clashing materials and the charring of plywood suggest that Jeram emphasized the manipulation of the material itself and the immediacy of the mark made, not representation. Jeram explicitly disclaims any creation of a pictorial image, considering it an imposition on the numenous. ‘I don’t want to create anything. The only thing that one can do is to destroy things... By burning wood I am making an attack on it’, he once said.

In 2023, the artist achieved a new high in the auction market with the sale of Journey into the Past (1963), offered in the South Asian Modern and Contemporary Art by Christie's, which concluded on 22 March 2023 at New York, achieving a sale price of ₹87,99,228.9 ($107,100). This record marked a defining moment in the artist's market history, reflecting both the significance of the artwork and its reception within the broader art world.

In 2005, the artist achieved a new high in the auction market with the sale of Untitled (1969), offered in the Masterpieces and Museum Quality Series: Indian Contemporary Art by Osian's, which concluded on 02 December 2005 at Mumbai, achieving a sale price of ₹4,60,000 ($9,973.98). This record marked a defining moment in the artist's market history, reflecting both the significance of the artwork and its reception within the broader art world.

In 1997, the artist achieved a new high in the auction market with the sale of Untitled (1974), offered in the The Intuitive-Logic II: Modern & Contemporary Indian Paintings, Drawings, Graphics, Sculpture & Tapestry by HEART, which concluded on 15 November 1997 at Mumbai, achieving a sale price of ₹80,000 ($2,177). This record marked a defining moment in the artist's market history, reflecting both the significance of the artwork and its reception within the broader art world.

In 2016, the artist achieved a new high in the auction market with the sale of Untitled (1974), offered in the Classical and Modern Indian Art by Pundole, which concluded on 21 April 2016 at Mumbai, achieving a sale price of ₹48,00,000 ($72,406). This record marked a defining moment in the artist's market history, reflecting both the significance of the artwork and its reception within the broader art world.

Jeram’s drawing begins in an unpremeditated way, as an act of ‘forgetting’…Jeram’s images convey an intensity in the mass of their black as he gathers ink around a point. Their bold silhouette also betrays a certain tension in the way they are drawn out with a dry brush or in the hatches of a nib to suggest fur or bristle. These forms are arranged against white paper like some transmuted characters of typography, assertive but not located in volumetric space…
The forms suggest a slow process of decomposition and simultaneous becoming, in spite of the memory of violence. The paradox of sensibility and act is thus captured in all its materiality and is given, in Jeram’s words, the ‘dignity of explicit aesthetics’.
Jeram’s presence in Baroda was felt as powerfully as that of Subramanyan. His personality – intense, singleminded, bold to the point of being brash and marked by an assertive male libido – attracted many. His continually itinerant, restless spirit… his bohemian ways, his hostility towards verbalizing art matters, and his immensely articulate visual expression made him an irresistible prototype of an artist. His work habits also had their aura. Jeram hardly made working a daily ritual (unlike Bhupen Khakhar or Subramanyan), but produced in impulsive and intensive spells enough work for a show or two each year, reaching a prolific count of thirty oneman shows in the last three decades.
His personality stood in contrast to that of Subramanyan. Despite the fact that the administrative positions he occupied were similar to that of Subramanyan, the image he projected was that of an anarchist – abrupt and impatient with adversaries, and of one who attacked the canvas frontally with a near-fatal determination to exterminate it… The example of creative energy he presented through his work, however, left a lasting impression on a generation of artists and designers wherever he worked… Imprints of Jeram’s work and personality can also be seen in the formative phases of a range of very different artists – Piraji Sagara, Himmat Shah, Laxma Goud, Arpita Singh, Manu Parekh and Sunil Das, to name a few.”

In 2022, an artwork by Jeram Patel was featured on the cover of Saffronart: The Art of India Online Auction (May 2022, Mumbai), marking a documented highlight in the artist's public and auction market visibility.

In 2022, an artwork by Jeram Patel was featured on the cover of Saffronart: The Art of India Auction (July 2022, Mumbai), marking a documented highlight in the artist's public and auction market visibility.